Making It

Recently, I went home, where I saw many doctors and friends of my parents.  The question that I received the most, of course, is:

"What are you doing with your life now?"

Now, if I was properly alpha and secure about myself, I probably would have responded simply with "Making it."  Or "Living."  Or something clever like that.

However, I'm not as clever as I wish I was (or perhaps I simply still have a few shreds of self-control and self-preservation), and so I instead regaled all these successful people with my plans to head off to graduate school, to hopefully discover something new that will convince people of importance to pay me money to continue poking at little bits of life.

Yay, science.

I do like science, I do.  If I didn't like science, then why would I write so much science fiction?  You see?  You can't explain that.  Insert face of Bill O'Reilly here.

Oh god, that was a mistake.

But on the other hand, there is a definitive reason why I keep on writing.  As long as I could remember, even back when I wanted to be a space ship designer and was convinced that the proper orientation of magnets would be the answer to traveling faster than the speed of light, I still wanted to be a writer at the same time.

And I'm not just talking science papers.  No, I wanted to write fiction!  I wanted to see my name on a book at Barnes and Noble, at the library, sign the front covers and know that people would be struggling to pronounce my name long after I'm dead.

And that's why I keep writing.  No, I don't always submit, edit, or even go back and reread what I've written, but at least I'm still writing.  I do submit a piece, occasionally.  And the rejection only crushes my spirit for a few weeks before I'm ready to try again.

And hopefully, hopefully, some day I will be able to call myself a writer.

I'll have made it.

P.S. I know, that's so uplifting.  Ladies, try to hold back your feelings of gushing, awkward, over-the-top love.

P.P.S. Looking at this post, all I can see is Bill O'Reilly.  I really need a second image, to distract from the middle-aged upper class white dude.

Oh god, I made it so much worse.